Worcester Election Commission to address state’s poll complaints

Friday

Nov 16, 2012 at 6:00 AMNov 16, 2012 at 6:33 PM

By Nick Kotsopoulos TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF

The chairwoman of the Election Commission wants the five-member board to meet in executive session with City Clerk David J. Rushford to discuss complaints directed at him by the secretary of state’s office.

No final date has been set for the closed-door meeting, though it is not expected to be held until next month, possibly as early as Dec. 3.

The Election Commission had originally planned to hold a post-election meeting on Tuesday, but that has been canceled.

Chairwoman Diane C. Mohieldin said last night she is going to ask her colleagues to meet in executive session with Mr. Rushford, if they so wish, so there can be a “frank and open dialogue” of the issues raised by the secretary of state’s office.

She said another item that needs to be taken up behind closed doors is a petition to remove a poll worker from the city’s elections staff, based on a complaint that arose from the Sept. 6 state primary.

Ms. Mohieldin said if Mr. Rushford preferred, the discussion could be held in open session.

Mr. Rushford had no comment.

He did confirm that Ms. Mohieldin informed him Wednesday in a telephone conversation about her desire to ask her colleagues to meet in executive session with him because she wants to improve communication between local election officials and the secretary of state’s office.

She followed that up in an email to Mr. Rushford yesterday.

“I think it is important for the commission to look into the complaints made by the secretary of state’s office and to do everything possible to ensure we have a good relationship with the state,” Ms. Mohieldin wrote. “My intent is to ask the commission to go into executive session to discuss these complaints.

“If they agree, we would go into executive session to discuss those complaints, not your professional competence,” she added. “Of course you have the right to seek counsel and to be present at any such meeting, even to have the meeting conducted in open session. My hope is that we can resolve this in one meeting, but if we need more meetings we can schedule them.”

Last Friday, Michelle K. Tassinari, director/legal counsel of the Elections Division in the secretary of state’s office, sent a letter to each of the election commissioners in which she said statements made by Mr. Rushford during a Nov. 2 commission meeting about certain communications with her office were “patently false.”

In her letter, Ms. Tassinari disputed Mr. Rushford’s claim that city election officials provided training materials used for polls workers to the secretary of state’s office. She said as of last Friday, her office had not received any training materials.

She also took issue with Mr. Rushford’s claim that local election officials invited the secretary of state’s office to one of their poll worker training session, but state election officials chose not to come. She claims that no request from Worcester about any training session was ever received.

The Nov. 9 letter from the secretary of state’s office followed another one sent on Oct. 30 in which the secretary of state’s office identified several requirements the commission reportedly had put in place for poll observers that were inconsistent with state election rules, and ordered the panel to correct them.

In that letter, Ms. Tassinari said the commission rules contained “numerous inaccuracies concerning rules applicable to the conduct of observers at a polling location.”

At the Nov. 2 Election Commission meeting, Commissioner David Lapierre questioned how things became so confusing. He said staff from the secretary of state’s office told him it offered to assist the city in training but Mr. Rushford did not accept, and it asked for the training materials used by local officials but never received them.